Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Cult Characteristic ❯ Chapter 15

FIFTEEN

Relena fell off her chair as the lights flickered and died and the colony shuddered. Something was wrong.

"Rose?" She called out to her friend, hand grasping in the dark, struggling to find the place her mind told her Rosemary Devourjac had been seated in but a moment before.

"Shh! Listen!" An all too familiar voice snapped and Relena obeyed. What was happening?

A loud explosion sounded in the distance and the colony shuddered again. It almost felt like…but there were no mobile suits left. Hands met warm wood and Relena turned her chair upright once more, sitting down as she tried to regain some semblance of calm. She was used to such situations. They never actually hurt her, just those stupid enough to get involved. And on L2, people were always getting involved.

"Senator Peacecraft?" The voice came from the doorway, strong, male, no doubt belonging to whatever floozy the Preventers had guarding her these days. All because Heero was being forced to baby-sit that pathetic invalid. Again. It always came back to him. While he wasn't around it was obvious who Heero cared for. Relena knew she just had to get rid of him. She just wasn't sure how.

"Yes?"

"Miss, you must come with me. The colony is under attack. The rotation coils have exploded, the air supply is no longer regenerating. There is only enough for twelve hours. Please, we have to get you to the shuttle."

The air supply…but everyone on L2 would die!

"What happened?"

"They…the reports say…something hit the main system's tower and knocked out the lights. The power coils followed. No one knows what's out there, but its just like…"

"A gundam." Rosemary Devourjac said darkly from Relena's side, only she didn't sounds like it was impossible, as it should have been. Rather, Relena thought Rose sounded like she had expected it.

"You aren't surprised?" Relena queried softly and a small laugh was her reply.

"Relena, don't interfere. Let me handle things and you'll finally have Heero Yuy all to yourself."

Something cold ran up Relena's spine as she peered across the darkness between them. There was no light. Another explosion rocked the colony and she fell to her knees, then she was drifting and she did not need the Preventer at the door to tell her what had happened. The gravity field was gone. They were dead in space.

"Maxwell…" Relena hissed, recognizing the tactic. But what was Duo doing here? And what was he using? Relena knew Deathscythe had been destroyed; she had made sure of that when she sent one of more annoying secretaries on a sacrificial mission with the Gundams into the Sun. Maxwell was harmless. Right?

"No, Miss Relena. That's Shinigami."

Relena heard a startled gasp, the light ping as if a gun had tried to fire and failed, or been silenced, then the soft hiss of a door shutting. Then there were hands on her upper arms and she was being tied down to her chair.

Light expoded. Rosemary was settled into a chair directly in front of her, a torch in one hand, sending shadows across her face. She was smiling. Relena felt ice cold fingers wrap themselves around her brain. Something was wrong. Where was Heero?

"Let me tell you a story, Senator Peacecraft," Rose said sagely. "Not so long ago, a missionary man came to L2, home of the scum of the universe, in the hopes of bringing the light of god. He built a church, and brought with him nuns to care for the sick, the weak, the poor. His work was prospering; the criminals of L2 stayed away from his church. They actually believed it was holy. Seeing this, Father Maxwell began to take in the street children, the orphans. He tried to educate them. But you see, the poor cannot be educated; they are ignorant of society and law and order. And that is exactly the way it must be. Without the poor, what are the rich?"

"Do you have a point?" Relena asked haughtily, though her heart was racing as she tried to figure out where this was going. There were no churches on L2…Relena would have known.

"The finny thing about people who live in the streets, is that the only thing they do know is each other. They know names, faces, places…ways to survive without money. They get reputations, and those reputations get them what they need. So you see, when my father needed something, he knew the names and their reputations, and he used that information."

"Senator Devourjac?"

"Yes, my father. What, surprised Relena? My Father moved to earth quite some time ago, but he never forgot where he came from. His ties to L2 are as strong as ever."

"I don't understand."

"Don't worry, Relena. I'm getting to that!"

The torch flickered. Relena heard slight stirring outside the door but didn't say anything. She only hoped the Preventer was not dead as she suspected. That Rosemary had not killed him with what she now assumed was a gun with a silencer. She prayed Rosemary was not mad. She wished Heero was there, but knew he must be on his way. He always was.

"So you see," Rosemary continued, noticing nothing out of place, "the war had just begun and the alliance was falling out of favor. My father sensed a change in the political waters and decided it was time to take a chance. It would not be hard to seize control of L2, but he needed a mobile suit to do it.

"Now, anyone from L2 can tell you that if you want something stolen, you get a street rat to do it. You find the best thief your money can buy and you use them."

"That's sick."

"That's life. That's the way it works, Relena. We don't all live in little crystal palaces. Now, there was a gang around this time who had the most glorious reputation for producing high quality thieves, and their leader was the greatest thief of all. A teenager by the name of Solo."

Recognition flared in Relena. She had heard Heero and Duo talk of someone called Duo. Could that be the same one? It would not surprise Relena. Duo was street trash; a dirty little thief. But…isn't that just how Rosemary saw them? We don't all live in crystal palaces…But you don't have to live like that. There is always a choice. Right?

"My father spent months tracking down the gang, talking to every contact he had until he finally found their last hideout, and do you know what he found?"

Relena shook her head, certain she didn't want to know. That glow in Rose's eyes was disturbing, foreign. Not right.

"Bodies. Dead bodies. A whole truck full. The plague had wiped almost all of them out."

Relena knew about the Plague. That many people crammed into a small place were getting sick anyway. The colony could not support the kinds of numbers that were growing on L2. They had to act. They released a biological aid into the poorer quarter, making sure the mainstream were all vaccinated. The poor were eradicated and the colony stabilized once more. For the first time Relena wondered at what cost.

"My father didn't give up, of course. He counted the bodies and realized there were five missing. After more searching he was able to track them…"

Relena shivered. She knew where they had been tracked to. There was only one place they could have gone. One place where the other street vermin would have been unable to find them.

"Father Maxwell."

"Oh, very good Relena!" Rose crowed in delight, the torch shaking in her grip. Relena saw a large explosion through the window stain the metal shell of sky red. How much longer?

"He tracked them to Maxwell Church. A week later a rebel group, led by my father, attacked the Church, taking everybody hostage. They found the five missing members of Solo's gang and demanded them to go to the alliance base and steal them a mobile suit."

Relena felt sick. Children, stealing mobile suits…

"It turned out three of the children were pickpockets. They couldn't do it. The fourth was still recovering from the plague. But one little spitfire dragon watched my father stick a gun to Father Maxwell's head and ran off at once. His was Solo's right hand, you see. He called himself Duo."

Relena's heart skipped a beat. Duo Maxwell. It made sense. But…he really was a thief; a dirty little street rat! And he stole from the alliance? Was that a bad thing? She was confused. It was impossible to know what to think.

"So, Duo runs off to steal a suit. I don't know how he did it, but he succeeded. But he returns to the Church only to find it in ruins; still burning, people still crying as they slowly died. You see, my father couldn't leave any witnesses."

They destroyed the Church! Relena felt tears prickling in her eyes. Why was she telling her this?

"So my father's rebel group watched little Duo pick his way through the ruins. They watched him find one of the nuns and he held her hand until she died. They watched him find the priest's body. Then, satisfied, they took the mobile suit while the boy's back was turned, and left him there."

Alone. Everyone dead. Relena felt the tears spill. She did not like Duo Maxwell, did not believe he was a good person, it was true. But no one deserved that!

"My father returned to earth and bought the Cult House. He built the pit and stored the mobile suit there, collecting a group of scientists to work on it. They studied the design, spent years evaluating ways to remake it; to make it better. Then, of course, OZ came to power, and with Oz came just what my father had been waiting for."

"Gundams."

"Oh, Relena, you are beginning to impress me! And here was I thinking you were just another dumb blonde. Yes, Gundams. And can you imagine how surprised we were when we learnt of the one called Deathscythe, and its braided pilot who called himself Shinigami? Can you imagine our delight when we learned his identity?"

Rose laughed. Relena felt her stomach drop. Of course, by the time the war came Rose was old enough to join her father's campaign for power. She herself was sent to Relena's school, no doubt to create the image of a family seeking peace while they promoted the war under everyone's noses. How had she herself, once Queen of the World, so completely misjudged their character?

Because they came up with a way for you to have Heero.

"So, we used the technology of the Gundam's to build out suit, basing it on the model Duo had stolen for us years before. But of course, the war ended. The Gundams won. You brought my father to power because I asked you to, and together we took over L2. We even got rid of Duo Maxwell for you. Of course, you had no idea we kept him alive. Everyone knows Duo Maxwell was in that pit for eight months. What they don't know is that it was eight months, in a pit, while we taunted him from above, and while we fed him information on how to fly the greatest machine of them all."

"You built a Gundam."

"Yes, Relena, we built a Gundam. And we have the greatest pilot in the world to fly it."

"Duo isn't the best."

"Oh, you think Heero can best him? Then pray tell. How did Duo defeat the mobile doll programs based on both Heero Yuy and Trowa Barton's data?"

"Because they were just dolls, not the real thing. Dolls can't think"

"And was not Heero Yuy just another doll? Another puppet?"

The Doctors. Why did it always come back to the doctors? Relena felt a headache coming on. For all she knew this was all one big tall tale. It was not worth this time. They had to get out before Duo, if that really was Duo, killed them all. And wasn't that just the point? Duo Maxwell was a common street thug; a vile murderer. He should be locked up, the key thrown away, swallowed in a dark pit…But they had already tried that.

"Duo won't do as you tell him to. As you pointed out, he steels his mobile suits. He takes no orders."

"Of course," Rose agreed, a genuinely happy smile plastered on her face. "We only needed him to break the peace, to come back to L2 and finish what we started. Your government has failed to maintain peace. L2 will be destroyed, along with the street rats who know what really happened, and the people will turn to the one person who can contain the most rabid of situations. After all, Senator Devourjac will not be needed here anymore. He will be put to much better use as King of The World."

"You would depose me?"

"Of course not Relena! You will still be Senator of the Sanq Kingdom, and you can happily retire, with Heero at your side."

"What about Duo?" And why the hell did she care? Duo Maxwell was none of her concern, but deep down Relena knew that as along as he lived Heero would be at his side. She could live with the other Gundam Pilots, but not that one.

"If Maxwell survives L2, and I very much doubt he will, my father will give him choice. Rot away in jail or live out the rest of his life under the Devourjac house's command. He will, after all, be the one held responsible for destroying the peace."

Relena scowled. While she hated Duo in her own way, he did not deserve this. He had been their pawn almost his whole life, the greatest thief alive taking orders from rats he didn't even know existed. Relena knew about corruption, but this…madness…was completely new. She didn't like it. Not one bit.

For the first time in her life, Relena hoped Duo would win, because she knew something Rosemary didn't. Duo Maxwell really was not the greatest thief alive. His alter ego held that honor, and Shinigami didn't steal suits. He stole lives.

"Shinigami's going to get you."

"He can try."

The door flung open, light spilling through the doorway. Shadows moved in, grabbed hold of Rosemary as another set of hands worked at the binds about Relena's wrists.

"Heero!" Relena squealed in triumph. She had known he would come; he always did. He had chosen, once again, to come to her aid, not Duo's. He loved her, not the thief. Everything was going to be alright.

"Let's go!"

Relena turned to see Preventer Chang in the doorway, gun slung over one shoulder, sword in his hand. He was covered in small burns and blood. When Relena finally got a good look at Heero he was similarly splattered. How bad was it outside?

Sound exploded nearby, yells, gunfire, shouts. Wufei disappeared from the doorway as Heero grabbed hold of Relena's wrist and hauled her after him.

It was too hard to see. Smoke filled the colony, ate the air, devoured the light. Torches shone through sporadically as panicking people tried to flee the dying wreck even as the street folk looted, plundered and killed. There was no law here, no order. Chaos reigned.

"Five!" A voice somewhere to the left.

"Here!" Chang answered, turning to face them as they emerged from the dark cloud of smoke billowing in through the front doors. Relena watched, shocked, as Quatre Winner came running through the entrance, rifle over one shoulder, extra rounds over the other.

"Where's Three?" Heero snapped, eyes scanning the mess.

"Here." Trowa Barton seemed to come out of the wall, sleek, silent, handgun in one hand, knife in the other. There was blood on the knife. Relena paled.

"Howard docked with the colony. His men are working on the rotation cylinders. He said they'll have air back in here in three hours." Quatre looked hopefully at Heero, who was calculating in his head. He finally nodded and they breathed heavily in relief.

"Heero, we have to go!" Relena pulled on his arm but did not dislodge it.

"Quatre, take Relena back to the ship."

"Heero, no!" Relena struggled against him, struggled against Quatre when she was passed into his care, but she could not break free. She stumbled as Quatre turned her away, pulled her off down a side alley. A glance over her shoulder revealed Heero, Wufei and Trowa disappearing down an alley filled with flame.